African Descent Marrow Donor Urgently Needed to Save Zyreal

I'm begging here. If you are of African descent (No matter what continent you live on) and if you are not in a National Marrow Donor Program PLEASE consider joining to help save Zyreal. Also please forward this message to anyone you know who might be able to help him.

Zyreal is an adopted 7 year old boy who suffers from Sickle Cell Anemia. He recently underwent a cord blood (stem cell) transplant to save his life but today his family found out the transplant failed. This means he is now left with no working bone marrow. His body cannot produce new blood cells or platelets so for the time being he will have to rely on transfusions to buy him more time. A better match must be found ASAP if Zyreal is going to survive.

Ethnicity is crucial. Any patient in need of a marrow transplant will most likely find a match within their own ethnic group so Zyreal needs more people of African descent to join the marrow donor program in case they are the one who is going to be able to save his life.

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IN THE UNITED STATES

If you live in the United States please go to Be the Match and enter your zip code to locate a live drive in your area:

http://www.marrow.org/JOIN/Join_in_Person/index.html

It takes 4 cotton swabs that you wipe on the inside of your cheeks to find out if you are the match that can help Zyreal. It can then take up to 10 weeks for the test to be processed. Zyreal cannot wait so please do not delay in locating a drive.

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ALL OTHER COUNTRIES

There is also a list of international marrow programs at this link:

http://helpingtami.org/asian_stem_cell_transplant_int_marrow_programs.html

Please contact a program near you to locate a live drive. In most countries testing is simply swiping the inside of your cheeks with 4 cotton swabs. It can then take up to 10 weeks for the test to be processed. Zyreal cannot wait so please do not delay in locating a drive.

2 Easy Ways You can Help Janet Find Her Cure for Cancer!

1. Business Cards
These are Janet's new business cards. You can order some from me (for free) to hand out to friends, leave a pile on your desk at work for colleagues or customers or keep a few in your wallet or purse to hand out to people you meet. CLICK HERE to place an order online.

This is the front of Janet's business cards

And this is the back

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2. Flyers
If you have a computer and a printer and somewhere to hang or hand out a flyer (i.e. your office at work, a community bulletin board, your church, a club or group, etc.) you can help me to help Janet. There are two parts to this flyer, the information sheet that you can print and hand out and the tear away tabs that can be added to the flyer for bulletin boards so that readers can take one with them to remember the website url when they go back to their computer.

(These links will open in new browser windows and may take up to 1 minute to load as they are high resolution, printable flyers.)

CLICK HERE to download the PDF of this flyer.

CLICK HERE to download the tear away tabs that can be attached to the bottom of the flyer.

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And this is Janet. You can visit her WEBSITE by CLICKING HERE. There you can learn more about her, how to join the National Marrow Donor Program and leukemia. For current updates visit her BLOG by CLICKING HERE.

Will you help her by joining the registry or by spreading the word that she needs more help and more people to register?

On August 24, 2009, 22 year old Janet Liang was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a form of blood cancer. Janet is currently living in the Bay Area and is undergoing chemotherapy in the hopes that she can attain a successful remission. If the chemo fails she will need a stem cell transplant. She will then be faced with the daunting task of locating a marrow match from the national or international registries after tests revealed that her only sibling is not a match. Processing new donor samples can take up to 2 months or more so it is crucial for people to be tested asap before her need becomes critical.

Already in the registry? No matter how long ago you signed up you will remain in the National Registry until you turn 61 years old. If you move or change your phone number you can update your contact information by CLICKING HERE.

Last year more then 4,400 people missed their opportunity to save a life when Be The Match was unable to locate them after they were a preliminary match for a patient in need.

Chinese and Asian Americans Please Help Me to Help Janet Liang

People this is the real deal. Twenty two year old Janet Liang is a patient in critical need. She was diagnosed just months ago with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (bi-phenotypic).

This is Janet's desperate truth, her plea to help her save her own life that I read last night in her most recent blog post. Many of the people who she thought would reach out to help her have not:

"I became distraught because an urgent email was sent from a coordinator at Asian Miracle Matches to 70 of my closest friends in Southern California that I was willing to burden. Only 2 of them replied. No, I’m not popular at all."

I am hoping that all of you will reach out to help her. There is something you can do. You can join the registry or if you already have I implore you to reach out to anyone you know who is of any Asian ethnicity (particularly if they are Chinese) and ask them if they have joined the registry.

Janet's match could be anyone you know and of any Aisan ethnicity whether they are a friend, family or extended family member, a colleague, neighbor, or anyone you might happen to meet in your day to day life. The base requirements are that they are 18-60 years of age and in good health.

If they say they are not in the registry please direct them to any of the following websites to learn more about the pain free registration process and the donation process that is not, contrary to popular beliefs, excruciatingly painful. Most people who donate their marrow or stem cells suffer from relatively little discomfort if any at all. Nausea and a bruised sensation is usually the worst of it. They can learn more about the donation process on theHelpingTami.org website by CLICKING HERE.

They can also learn where live drives are held nationwide or how to order a home test kit at:

Live Drives Nationwide Using their Zip Code Locater
The National Marrow Donor Program website: www.BeTheMatch.org

Southern California Live Drives
Asians for Miracle Matches website: www.AsianMarrow.org

Northern California Drives
Asian American Donor Program website: www.AADP.org

More words from Janet:

"There’s an overwhelming amount of guilt I feel and frustration, because all I can do is keep asking and begging. That’s all I’m good for these days with no guaranteed promise of the ability to return your favors. I also understand that many of you have fruitful, promising lives/futures and are extremely busy. All I can really tell you is that I have about 3-4 months time to come up with some kind of bone marrow donor match. That is nearly impossible. The pressure is on, as my doctors and bone marrow transplant coordinator continuously remind me of the time-sensitive nature of treating this disease. If not, they’ll continue to drag it on and on, keeping me alive with one chemo round after another until I become resistant to it and there’s no other alternative except an umbilical cord transplant, which will buy more time and is currently in the research/experimental stages."